Lillian watched as he left the bathroom, then immediately opened each stall, checking which window frame might be bigger.
Conrad stepped out of the bathroom, and Andrew looked at him, as if wanting to say something but holding back.
“If you’ve got something to say, just say it. Stop stuttering.”
Andrew sighed. “Sir, the way you’re acting, and with her personality, I don’t think she’ll ever compromise.”
“So what do you think I should do?” Conrad snapped. “I’ve been treating her like a little prince, pampering her and giving in to her. Has the situation improved? She just leaves when she wants to. What does she take me for?”
When had he ever treated anyone this way? And what did he get in return? It was all so painfully ironic. It almost seemed easier to just do whatever he wanted. At least hate lasted longer than love.
“Why’s she taking so long?” Conrad muttered, looking at the cigarette he was holding, which had burned halfway down. He turned back toward the bathroom.
When he walked back in, he saw Lillian poking at the ventilation fan with a mop.
She stiffened when she saw him return, but she set the mop down without expression and walked toward him as if she had resigned herself to fate.
Each step seemed as though he were forcing her into a fire.
In the end, Lillian was taken back to the car.
“You find it fun, staring at me like that? Are you planning to stare at me for the rest of my life? I’ll find a way to escape sooner or later.”
“Then let’s see. Who’s faster, you running, or my patience? Lillian, I’ll keep playing this game with you.”
“Conrad, is it that you want to ruin me out of all the women in the world?”
“Maybe.” His voice was calm, devoid of the arrogance he once had, but it was laced with a strange obsession. “But if I really let you go, I’d truly lose you, Lillian.”
Lillian felt a sharp pain in her chest, as if all the endless resentment and the hurtful words he had thrown at her over the past three years had suddenly turned into something tangible and unbearable.
“It doesn’t matter to me anymore.”
It was the first time she had told him this.
Your anger, your care, your demands-they no longer mattered to me.
The only thing you’ve confined is my freedom.
And whether it’s selfish love or obsessive love, whatever it is-it’s all your love, and I don’t want it anymore.
But Conrad just gave a faint, emotionless smile, and without saying anything more, motioned for the driver to continue on their way to the airport.
By the time they reached City N, Lillian didn’t even want to open her eyes or speak to the man beside her. Perhaps all her emotions had already been spent in the explosion earlier.
The plane had already landed. The pilot and Andrew had already disembarked. But Lillian wrapped herself in a blanket, keeping her eyes shut as if staying that way could somehow convince her that she was still in this hellhole, that she hadn’t been dragged back by him.
Conrad’s hand gently brushed over her forehead and eyes–slowly, inch by inch, his gaze was deep and focused.
With touches like this, there was no way she could still be asleep, yet she didn’t even tremble. If it weren’t for the faint rise and fall of her breath, he would’ve thought she was just a doll.
It was his fantasy again.
So he pressed a little harder on her.
Lillian finally opened her eyes, irritated. “Can you just let me rest?”
“We’re here,” he replied. He knew that over the past few days, he’d lost control a little.
But if it hadn’t been for all the wild sex that helped him feel more at ease, he didn’t know what he would have done to himself.
Lillian curled her lips into a cold smile. Now, he was acting all reasonable.
She lowered her legs. After feeling so insecure earlier, she had curled up with her knees against her chest. But as she let her legs down, it felt as though a thousand ants were crawling on her skin, making her feel itchy and uncomfortable.
She picked up the knife and fork in front of her, preparing to finish the steak she hadn’t eaten yet.
But a hand moved faster than hers and was about to take it away.
Lillian’s knife grazed his hand.
The knife was sharp, and the cut, when it happened, was an unexpected accident for both of them.
Lillian looked at him expressionlessly, then continued to reach for the plate with the steak.
Conrad pressed his lips together and swept the steak off the table, sending it to the floor.
Silence hung in the air.
He was accusing her of her indifference.
In his usual way, he was telling her.
Lillian looked up at him. “Mr. Conrad, if you didn’t want me to eat, then why did you have it brought to me?”
Conrad wasn’t the type to make a fuss over a small cut, but he couldn’t ignore how Lillian’s attitude seemed to show she didn’t care.
The atmosphere chilled.
She, on the other hand, didn’t seem bothered and casually laid back down.
“Go make a new steak,” Conrad said in a flat tone.
Lillian opened her eyes. “I don’t need it.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t need it.”
“Then why did you need it earlier?”
“Because the one I wanted was thrown on the floor. I don’t have the habit of eating off the ground.”
“Making a new one won’t take long.”
“So what? I don’t like you coming near me. You’re still coming after me. You’re forcing food on me that I don’t want. What’s the point?”
“Do you not like me, or do you not like the steak I had made for you?” Conrad seemed determined to get an answer.
He would never have asked these kinds of questions before. He wouldn’t have even thought to press her like this.
Things had changed.
He had changed. She had changed.
But he still thought they could go back to how things were.
“Sorry, but clearly, I don’t like you or the steak.”
“Is that so? Then why don’t you just kill me now? If you do, maybe you’ll be free.”
Lillian was still holding the knife.
Conrad watched her, grabbing her hand and using the knife to point at himself. He then guided it toward his chest.
“You want to stab me here, just push harder, and it’ll be over.”
“Complete freedom.”
“You choose.”
Lillian stared at him. “You think I won’t?”
“You can, just do it.”
He leaned in, but didn’t wait for her to act. Instead, he bent down and kissed her.
She didn’t move, not until their breaths met, and then he kissed her deeply.
A dull pain suddenly surged through his back.
Conrad froze for a moment, then kissed her even more forcefully.
The harder he sucked on her lips, the harder she gripped the knife.
She could feel his emotions.
He thought she couldn’t bring herself to kill him.
He thought she was kissing him with joy.
But he was wrong.
The chains that held her, the verbal insults that scarred her soul, and the love she once gave so freely-after three years of it all, were drained, consumed in a lifetime of being his mistress.
Her love for him had become like the nutrients in the mud, and even though she didn’t want to admit it, in the nights spent tangled in his arms, she had loved him to the very core.
But that was where it ended.
“Don’t forget what you once told someone else,” she said, her voice calm but cold. “A woman like me, you should just play with for a while. Now, you can’t play anymore?”
She looked into his pained eyes and swiftly pulled the knife from his back.
But he just smiled faintly, “Too bad, you didn’t stab deep enough. It wasn’t my heart.”
He added, “You still can’t bring yourself to kill me. Then you better get ready to be entangled with me for the rest of your life.”